It has been known that a side airbag structure is equipped with a seat, wherein an airbag is disposed in a side support that is provided in a side portion of a seatback of the seat. The airbag is designed to inflate during side collision of a vehicle so as to absorb collision energy generated during the side collision of the vehicle, which may result in protecting a chest and a waist of a passenger of the vehicle.
In this type of side airbag structure, the airbag is required to cleave the side support in the instant of a collision and to inflate as quickly as possible, without deteriorating a feeling of sitting for the passenger in normal condition (excluding the collision of the vehicle).
For this reason, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 11-124001 discloses a side airbag structure having a low expansion strip disposed inside of a extensile seat skin and extending from rear to side of a seatback of the seat, wherein one end of the low expansion strip is attached to the inside of the seat skin in the vicinity of a seam and the other end of the low expansion strip is attached to a seatback frame of the seatback. Therefore, expansion of the seat skin along the rear and the side of the seatback can be inhibited by the low expansion strip.
Thereby, the seat for the vehicle having the side airbag structure disclosed in the Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 11-124001 can be prevented from deteriorating the feeling of sitting for the passenger in normal condition (excluding the collision of the vehicle). In the case of a side collision of the vehicle, the side airbag structure can make the airbag cleave the side support in the instant of the collision and inflate the airbag as quickly as possible.
Further, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2000-16223 also discloses a side airbag structure having a low expansion strip disposed inside of a seat skin, wherein one end of the low expansion strip is attached to the inside of the seat skin in the vicinity of a seam and the other end of the low expansion strip is attached to a seatback frame of the seatback. Therefore, expansion of the seat skin along the rear and the side of the seatback can be inhibited by the low expansion strip. Also, a side airbag unit is disposed so as to inflate the airbag outward and frontward. Further, a notch is provided inside of the cushion pad of the seatback presented in an inflation direction of the airbag.
Thereby, the seat for the vehicle having the side airbag structure disclosed in the Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2000-16223 can be prevented from deteriorating the feeling of sitting for the passenger in normal condition (excluding the collision of the vehicle). In the case of a side collision, the side airbag structure can make the airbag cleave the notch in the instant of the collision and inflate the airbag in the outward and frontward direction as quickly as possible.
Although these side airbag structures can inflate the airbag quickly, the notch and/or the cushion pad will be cleaved after the cushion pad has been compressed between the airbag and the seat skin during inflation of the airbag. Therefore, the cushion pad in compressed state may crash into the passenger of the vehicle, which disadvantageously may not result in absorbing the collision energy sufficiently by the airbag during a side collision of the vehicle.
This invention is made so as to address this problem. A purpose of this invention is to provide a side airbag structure equipped with a seat that is capable of absorbing the collision energy sufficiently during a side collision of the vehicle. This may be achieved by diminishing the volume of the cushion pad put and compressed between the airbag and the passenger when the inflating airbag crashes into the passenger.